Harry Reid vows floor fight for judicial nominees

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid went public Monday with a threat he’s been voicing privately for weeks: He is taking extraordinary procedural steps to confirm stalled judicial nominees even if it ties up the Senate floor.

It amounts to a gamble, diverting the Senate’s focus from unemployment and gas prices, the dominant issues of this election year. But Reid believes Republicans have been out of line in their “obstruction” of nominations that have bipartisan support and that they would be blamed for forcing the Senate to spend time on noncontroversial nominees rather than on the economy.

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With no agreement from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Reid filed cloture Monday on each of the 17 nominees in order to overcome a filibuster threat — a time-consuming process. The fight could still be averted if Reid and McConnell reach a deal.

But otherwise, the chamber could be in for a tedious March. And it could lead to a new front in the judicial wars that have dominated the Senate in recent years: District judgeships have never been successfully filibustered.

The 17 of the nominated judges would serve on federal district courts in Virginia, Utah, California, New York, Louisiana, Texas, Illinois, Maryland and several other states.

On the floor Monday, Reid said he had no choice but to press the issue because 160 million Americans live in areas under the jurisdiction of courts considered “judicial emergencies” because of their vacancies.

“Unfortunately for tens of millions of Americans, that right to equal justice under law is at risk, and I’m sorry to say it’s at risk because of Republican ideology,” he said. “Americans can no longer rely on fair and speedy trials.”

Don Stewart, McConnell’s spokesman, argued that Democrats are responsible for the vacancy rate on the federal courts. President Barack Obama has nominated people for only 39 of the 83 vacancies on federal courts, and about half of those are awaiting final action in the Senate Judiciary Committee, he said.

Moreover, he chided Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) for saying Sunday that Democrats are “focused like a laser on jobs, the economy and the middle class.”

“I thought the Senate was going to focus on jobs, gas prices and the economy,” Stewart said. “But as it turns out, Sen. Schumer’s statement lasted just over 24 hours.”

The White House and Democrats argue that Republicans have gone to great lengths to hold up nominees as political payback against the administration. This latest battle is also tied up in the larger fallout from Obama’s decision in January to install four executive branch nominees when the Senate was not technically in an extended recess, a move that infuriated the GOP.

“Now there’s some problems that Congress can’t solve,” Reid said, warning the judicial fight could occur after action on a highway bill is completed. “But this isn’t one of these problems.”

“I think if the leader goes through with this, Republicans will be pretty unified,” Kyl said Monday. “I think we will reject the leader’s attempt to invoke cloture.”

The latest fight could worsen the gridlock that’s been pervasive in the Senate. There have been just 35 votes and none Friday or Monday. Reid and McConnell spent a month trying to negotiate a deal on which amendments could come up for a vote when the highway bill reached the floor. They hope to complete work on that measure this week.

Why doesn't he just wait until November when, according to him (Reid), they will take both houses of Congress on the coattails of Obama? Seems like he's tipping his hand a bit by panicking that if he doesn't get them done now, they may not get another chance!

Reid has a history of tabling all bills the house sends to the senate in an attempt to paint the house as a do nothing congress, but the do nothing congress is the fault of Reid. He and the senate have the authority to add, delete and change any bill that goes to the senate, they can make any bill from the house and turn it into their own bill and then send it to the reconciliation committee. He has refused to do this. Reid is one of the most partisan individuals to be a leader in the senate in a long, long time. In fact I can't remember any other Majority Party leader going back to LBJ when he was majority leader of the senate during the Eisenhower Administration. Party over country, Reid epitimizes that.

This is all so ridiculous. I want the government I pay for, not this dog and pony show.

Senator Kyl hasn't learned much. He still thinks that showing a unified obstructionist front is good politics. But Senator McConnell is no better. Anyone that says that their sole goal is to see the President fail is also assuring that the American people fail.

I am hopeful that after the elections of 2012, we will have sent people to Washington that are true states men and women who will do what is best for this country and not what is best for their political party.

I LOVE IT!!! Reid is fooling around and playing games with judicial nominees while gas is over $4.00 a gallon, unemployment is over 8% and the economy is still shaky........Keep it up Harry, your party has to defend twice the number of seats this year as Republicans...lol

I remember trying to finish my divorce about 20 years ago. My soon to be ex and I had about 15 different court appearances. Each time we arrived for our scheduled court date and time we were turned away. There weren't enough judges to hear all of the cases that were pending and criminal cases took priority over family law cases. It took almost three years to get our divorce finalized, not to mention all of the money for our attorneys and all of the time I had to take off of work. Judges are important.

Don Stewart, McConnell’s spokesman, argued that it’s Democrats who are responsible for the vacancy rate on the federal courts. President Barack Obama has only nominated people for 39 of the 83 vacancies on federal courts, and about half of those are awaiting final action in the Senate Judiciary Committee, he said.

Moreover, he chided Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) for saying Sunday that Democrats are “focused like a laser on jobs, the economy and the middle class.”

Hmmmm.

I'm thinking this reply to Reid will probably trump his attempt to keep the voters eyes off the real issues.

An unfortunate situation, but a necessary maneuver on Sen. Reid's part. These qualified nominees have been waiting far too long for a floor vote. The article is correct in that the President has been slow to nominate judges, although the pace has picked up somewhat in the last year. Nonetheless, Republicans have been major obstructionists in preventing these confirmation votes. Of the seventeen judicial nominees that Reid filed a cloture vote for, about only three were voted out of the Judiciary Committee on a roll call vote. The rest were noncontroversial nominees, that would likely get a near unanimous vote on the Senate floor. This is how dysfunctional the Senate has become - Republicans should step up here and allow these noncontroversial nominees a floor vote, immediately.

Granted, this might not be a priority issue for most Americans, but it is extremely important that we fill these vacancies. It is, however, a priority for criminal defendants and plaintiffs in a civil suit who now see their cases delayed for a needless amount of time because judge's simply just cannot keep up with the pace, so overburdened are their dockets. Senators Lee and DeMint claim to be "defenders of the Constitution", how are you doing that by delaying access to justice for millions of Americans?

the republicans have gone overboard on attempting to block this president from filling judgeship vacancies in their activism goal of only allowing vacancies to be filled if republicans get to pick who.

Obviously citizens are being impacted.

Meanwhile the republicans have their laser like focus on shutting down Planned Parenthood and continuing their attacks on women - in particular poor women.

Their priority seems to be the scarlet letter A, and implementing male oversight and control of women's body's.

Arizona thinks its fine for doctor's to lie to a woman about prenatal testing that turns up bad news. Shades of Rick Sanctorum...

Naturally you're not interested in providing any evidence that these judges are controversial.

I always believed a president should have his appointments with the exception of the SCOTUS more or less automaticly approved. Appointments as far back as I can remember, Eisenhower through Reagan when he attempted to appoint Robert Bork were pretty much non affairs. Robert Bork was one smart and almost overqualified judge but he didn;t meet the political ideology of the Senate at that time and hence the term Borked was generated. The Democrats who started this with Robert Bork have no one to blame but themselves. Sooner or later what goes around comes around.